***STAFF FILE PHOTO*** The end of the 710 Freeway at Valley Boulevard in Alhambra on Friday, March 6, 2015. Caltrans and Metro released an environmental study examining a tunnel, a light-rail train, or a bus line to connect from Alhambra Pasadena. (Photo by Watchara Phomicinda/ San Gabriel Valley Tribune)

LOS ANGELES >> In a historic vote, the governing board of the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority unanimously rejected an extension of the 710 Freeway on Thursday, saying building a multibillion-dollar tunnel would not be feasible.

The 12-0 vote removes the 6.3-mile freeway tunnel from the list of alternatives, the final option for closing the 710 Freeway gap from El Sereno through South Pasadena and Pasadena. The freeway extension has been on the state’s master freeway list since 1959.

Caltrans is expected to vote on the car-tunnel project in 2018, after it completes a final environmental impact report released in March 2015.

“This is a day that will go down in the record books,” said board member and Glendale City Councilman Ara Najarian, who has opposed a surface and tunnel freeway extension for decades. He was often the lone “no” vote on the Metro board.

On Thursday, the anti-tunnel sentiment swept through the board, taking in newly elected representatives from the county, the city of Los Angeles and cities of the San Gabriel and San Fernando valleys.

“The tunnel … is not going to fix what is happening right now in our communities. We need to do something now,” said Supervisor Kathryn Barger, elected in November. She replaced tunnel supporter Mike Antonovich.

While the Los Angeles City Council’s opposition has grown, Mayor Eric Garcetti led the L.A. delegation in killing the 710 tunnel.

Garcetti said he has relatives who lost their homes to a freeway right-of-way project. And he noted other freeway extensions have been killed in the past — the 2 Freeway was supposed to connect all the way over in Beverly Hills.

“As a county, as a region, we’ve moved on from new freeways,” Garcetti said. “That is not something we are investing in anymore.”

Instead of building a toll-tunnel from the terminus at Valley Boulevard in El Sereno through South Pasadena and Pasadena to the 210/134 freeway interchange, the board went small, proposing myriad street-level fixes. First, it will spent $105 million of approximately $730 million available from Measure R for initial improvements to local streets by adding capacity, new bus lines, traffic signal synchronization and bike lanes.

Later, it will develop projects for El Sereno, East Los Angeles, Alhambra, South Pasadena, Pasadena and La Cañada Flintridge from the remaining $625 million.

The motion, one of five options made available in the EIR, was conceived by Metro Chairman and Duarte City Councilman John Fasana, a longtime proponent of the 710 Freeway extension.

“I thought the tunnel was the best approach. I’ve come to the realization it is not fundable,” Fasana said.

The board’s direction angered elected officials from Monterey Park, Rosemead and Alhambra, who said the tunnel is needed to relieve local traffic congestion, a conclusion supported by Metro staff.

Metro’s most recent evaluation found the single-bore tunnel would provide “substantial benefits in terms of reducing congestion” and was the best of five options outlined in the EIR.

Rosemead City Councilman Steven Ly asked the board not to approve the streets alternative. He and others hold out hope that Caltrans will pump new life into the dying tunnel option.

“I can tell you we will do everything possible to argue our case to Caltrans,” Ly said.

State Sen. Anthony Portantino, D-La Cañada Flintridge, said he’s talking to Caltrans and to Brian Kelly, secretary of the State Transportation Agency.

“This action sets the table for Caltrans to deliver the decisive blow,” he said.

With the vote, cities such as Pasadena can now work on bettering the look of the so-called 710 stub between Del Mar Boulevard and Walnut Street.

“This freeway has really created a blight in the corridor and prevented us from doing a lot of things,” Pasadena Mayor Terry Tornek said. “That real estate is immediately adjacent to Old Pasadena. When I look at those stubs, I see magical things happening there.”

Jonathan Edewards, president of the Downtown Pasadena Neighborhood Association, told the board the freeway project was like a sinkhole, stagnating creative energy and resources into quicksand while traffic worsened. “We’ve opposed the 710 tunnel because of the opportunity costs,” he said.

The cities of Glendale, La Cañada Flintridge, Pasadena, Sierra Madre and South Pasadena — which together form the group Beyond the 710 — proposed alternatives to the tunnel exactly two years ago.

Those options include building a two-lane “Golden Eagle Boulevard” from the south stub at Valley Boulevard, just north of the 10 Freeway, to Mission Road, or a busway from Old Pasadena to East Los Angeles College, among other ideas.

Steve Scauzillo covers environment and transportation for the Southern California News Group. He has won two journalist of the year awards from the Angeles Chapter of the Sierra Club and is a recipient of the Aldo Leopold Award for Distinguished Editorial Writing on environmental issues. Steve studied biology/chemistry when attending East Meadow High School and Nassau College in New York (he actually loved botany!) and then majored in social ecology at UCI until switching to journalism. He also earned a master's degree in media from Cal State Fullerton. He has been an adjunct professor since 2005. Steve likes to take the train, subway and bicycle – sometimes all three – to assignments and the newsroom. He is married to Karen E. Klein, a former journalist with Los Angeles Daily News, L.A. Times, Bloomberg and the San Fernando Valley Business Journal and now vice president of content management for a bank. They have two grown sons, Andy and Matthew. They live in Pasadena. Steve recently watched all of “Star Trek” the remastered original season one on Amazon, so he has an inner nerd.

Join the Conversation

We invite you to use our commenting platform to engage in insightful conversations about issues in our community. Although we do not pre-screen comments, we reserve the right at all times to remove any information or materials that are unlawful, threatening, abusive, libelous, defamatory, obscene, vulgar, pornographic, profane, indecent or otherwise objectionable to us, and to disclose any information necessary to satisfy the law, regulation, or government request. We might permanently block any user who abuses these conditions.

If you see comments that you find offensive, please use the “Flag as Inappropriate” feature by hovering over the right side of the post, and pulling down on the arrow that appears. Or, contact our editors by emailing moderator@scng.com.